The headline, which made adequate use of alliteration, jumped out at me from this newspaper’s front page last week: “Boyle Building to bloom again.”
The accompanying story noted that a building at one of the state’s key intersections—Capitol and Main in Little Rock—will be transformed into a hotel by the Chi family, which owns five restaurants and two motels in the city. Based on the quality of their restaurants, downtown Little Rock is in for a treat. Thus continues a downtown renaissance in the state’s largest city, something many Arkansans felt they would never live to see.
Downtown was a sad place when I moved to Little Rock in late 1981 to work in the sports department at the Arkansas Democrat. Between 1960 and 1980, Little Rock’s population had grown just 10 percent. The combined population of Benton, Bryant, Cabot, Conway, Jacksonville, North Little Rock and Sherwood had grown by more than 120 percent in those 20 years. Retailers followed residents. The 1959 construction of the Park Plaza shopping center on University Avenue in what was then considered west Little Rock, along with the 1973 opening of McCain Mall in North Little Rock, hastened downtown’s decline.
Little Rock business leaders formed the Metrocentre Improvement District in 1973 in an attempt to “save downtown” from the “urban blight and decay” that threatened the “property tax and revenues sources of the city.” Part of the plan was to develop a pedestrian mall along Main Street. Six blocks were closed to vehicular traffic in 1977 and that stretch was advertised to retailers as a “real alternative to bland suburban shopping centers and malls.” The concept was an utter failure, though Main Street wasn’t reopened to traffic until 1991.
The Boyle Building is among downtown’s most handsome structures. It was designed by George Mann, who earlier had designed the state Capitol. Construction was completed in 1909. It was the tallest building in the city until the 1920s. The original design called for a restaurant in the basement and space on the main floor for four retailers and State National Bank. The bank went under in 1911. In 1916, the building was purchased by the Boyle Realty Co., which advertised that it would offer office space at the “traffic center of the city.” Businesses that called the Boyle Building home included Bell’s Sandwich Shop, Robert H. Brooks Advertising Co., Keeby Jewelers, Southern Securities Co., Guarantee Shoe Co., Peoples Building & Loan Association and Chandler’s Shoes.
The Boyle Building announcement comes at a time when construction is about to begin on two other downtown hotels—a 135-room Hilton Garden Inn and a 115-room Hilton Homewood Suites. Downtown Little Rock already has seen the addition of three hotels in the past decade by the McKibbon Group of Georgia—a 120-room Courtyard by Marriott in 2004, a 119-room Hampton Inn & Suites in 2008 and a 107-room Residence Inn by Marriott in 2013. Add to that mix the millions of dollars in upgrades being done at the Little Rock Marriott, which switched from the Peabody flag last year, and recent upgrades at the Doubletree Hotel. Meanwhile, the Capital Hotel, which opened in January 1877 and has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 1974, gets better with age. The hotel brought in a world-renowned chef, Joel Antunes, at the start of 2013 and plans to renovate its dining room later this year.
The Chi family purchased the Boyle Building from a company led by Scott Reed, who is completing work on the Main Street Lofts and K Lofts downtown. The Chi family has partnered with Reed to develop the Hall-Davidson Building on Capitol Avenue into the Capitol Lofts. It has been rumored that well-known Little Rock chef Donnie Ferneau will open a restaurant on the ground floor of that complex. The Hall-Davidson Building was constructed in 1923 by the Boyle Realty Co.
The pace of redevelopment along Main Street and Capitol Avenue has now reached critical mass. Success likely will beget success, leading to the level of evening activity along these streets that one now finds in the nearby River Market District. Already, last fall’s downtown reopening of Bruno’s Little Italy—once a favorite Italian restaurant for diners in west Little Rock—has brought evening life to a block of Main Street that previously was desolate after dark. Bruno’s is part of the Mann on Main, a mixed-use complex developed by the Doyle Rogers Co. and Moses Tucker Real Estate, in the building that once housed Blass Department Store. The $22 million project includes 90,000 square feet of office space, 30,000 square feet of residential space and a four-level parking garage. The main building, constructed in 1906, was designed by George Mann and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
On that same block, Little Rock advertising and public relations firm Cranford Johnson Robinson Woods will move into the Fulk Building. Renovations will begin later this year, and the agency plans to move in next year. Just across the street, a building will be renovated to house Jones Film Video, a CJRW subsidiary. CJRW negotiated with Terraforma Inc., a land acquisition and development firm, for the space. Terraforma has hired Jameson Associates as the architect for the projects.
“A healthy Main Street makes for a healthy city,” says Doug Meyer of Terraforma. “With all the momentum on Main Street right now, this thing is snowballing. It’s wonderful.”
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Freelance columnist Rex Nelson is the president of Arkansas’ Independent Colleges and Universities. He’s also the author of the Southern Fried blog at rexnelsonsouthernfried.com.